Home DIY

Thanks, that’s a handy website.
In a similar boat to you. Had a few people around to have look at the doors, but they’re either too busy or just not interested, so decided to just get on with it myself.

buy a manual mitre saw

Yes. Jigsaws are only really good at the jigsaw part (unless are supper skilled).

If space is a real issue you could just get the saws and made some kind of jig that you can disassemble. But they're not that big.

Just to check do you mean one of these

Or one of these

?

As one is obviously much bigger and the other fine for occasional use.

Threaded insert question - How big should I be drilling the hole for the inserts.

The specs say a pilot hole measurement of 6.6-7.2.

I'm thinking 7mm drill bit, and epoxy the thing for added strongth.

What are you putting them in? If hardwood I'd suggest these - much finer thread. Also, T shaped hex key for putting them in.

Assuming you're putting it into wood then epoxy won't really add anything because the wood fibers will break before anything else anyway.
For the hole size: softer material = smaller hole.

Thanks both .

They're going into hardwood ply, if that makes a difference?

I only use the fine thread ones, for all woods. Do a couple of different sized test holes to see what works best.

Tried to use some like you linked to that came with window catches, they ruined the pine frame. As chiroshi says, don't bother with epoxy. It'd probably just get into the machine thread and render the whole thing useless.

Cool - cheers. I'll pick up the tapered ones & do some testing on a spare bit of ply.

Thanks again.

How would the hive repair this (and refix curtain pole to wall)?
For ref, central holes are ~15mm and caused by plasterboard fixings.

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I'm going to be cutting through paving slabs with an angle grinder, with the appropriate disc.

Ear, eye and breathing protection.

What else? Should I keep the slabs/blade wet to reduce dust/heat?

Should I make several shallow passes or go deep straight off?

Can anyone help me with my washing machine mystery? I find these fabric bits after every wash, looks like foam padding of some kind. Just did an empty run and there were even more of them. Seems like something worked itself loose inside the machine, but what could it be? It’s a pretty standard three year old zanussi washing machine.

Is there masonry directly behind the plasterboard? Or is it dot and dab or something with a gap?

Looks like this

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I usually have a hose dribbling water into the cut. It's really messy, but so much more preferable to spaffing concrete dust everywhere.

I score a line first, then go deep (I'm usually just making rough holes / channels though).

I'd just take the top off and have a look inside.

That look like some sort of noise insulation.

Thanks, will do that!

Not directly, I think there’s a gap and it’s probably Victorian lathe with a couple of different skim coats on top.

I’m tidying up tired floor lamp. I’ve given the brass rods that make up some of the upright section a good brasso sesh. Any recommendations for what I should coat it with to stop tarnishing?

I meant the latter but yeah it’s a bit bulky. I also already own these... maybe just line the angle up and plunge it?

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Pretty much anything. Wax, shellac, polyurethane.

Are you fixing in same place?

Ideally fairly similar, although there’s a bit of lateral adjustment possible (you can see a previous repair on the left).

thanks, that's useful info

Cut them wet but if it's not a dedicated wet cutter depends how many you have to do before you'll kill it. A normal cutter will survive a fair amount of water though, usually from a hose but a watering can will do. Helps if you have 2 people.

I have a rechromed seatpost on my old tandem (it's one of those old style 1930s "7" shaped posts, so it's not easy to simply replace it with another one, plus the diameter is weird).

The trouble is, following the chroming process, the diameter of the bottom few cm of the post is about 0.4mm thicker than that further up (reason being that obviously this part hadn't corroded so required less polishing during the rechroming process), with the result that it is now slightly too thick for the seat tube.

Any suggestions as to what to use to bring this thickness down - hold it in a vice and use one of those leather straps for knives for example? I'm not going to take it back to the chromers as they're miles away and its just a little job (which they're likely to fuck up).